For the people who are against Complete Streets, City Engineer Michael Oakes has one thing to say — he understands.

Wait, what?

That's right. Oakes said up until about eight or nine years ago, he felt the same way.

Oakes said the "light bulb went on" after he attended the Congress for the New Urbanism Transportation Conference in Kansas City, Mo., several years ago.

During the conference, presenters described the concept of what is now known as Complete Streets.

"They weren't even calling it Complete Streets at that time," he said. "But they were talking pedestrian-friendly and bicycle-friendly and multi-modal, all of these things."

He said the designs appealed to his "love of good development."

"[Attendees] started looking at the kind of developments that were possible if you would slow things down and make it pedestrian-friendly; make it places where people would want to go hang out, feel safe to hang out, not worried about trucks going by at 55 mph at the cafe table. That's kind of where it all came from," he said.

Oakes — who was working as the County Engineer in Shelby, Tenn., when he attended the conference — said he was more comfortable following tradition and didn't easily accept the new ideas.

"I didn't change overnight," he said. "I have voted against doing roundabouts 10 years ago. I have approved and insisted on countless miles, in my career, of four 12-foot lane collectors through what [were] going to be nothing but simple neighborhoods and looking back on it now, I've got to say, I can't believe my light bulb didn't come on by itself, but it didn't."

The main purpose of Complete Streets is safety, he said.

"I recognize, in my profession, that it's better for our city not to drive that fast," he said. "Inside our city, why don't we want to go slower?"

The Complete Streets design uses tools — such as retrofitted streets and speed trees among other things — to slow down drivers.

"We can take a fast street and make it behave like a slower street," Oakes said. "It was really revolutionary, in my mind, to do that."

South Phoenix Avenue is an example of a retrofitted street, where bike lanes were added to make the lanes narrower and urge people to be cautious.

Oakes said speed trees have a dual purpose.

"So what we want to do [is] put in speed trees because they're beautiful, they add the ambiance to the neighborhood, the value to the neighborhood, but they also — as they get larger and larger and larger — they encroach you," he said, adding that drivers who feel encroached drive "more carefully and slower."

City officials haven't taken any action regarding any future Complete Streets projects. Oakes is expected to give a more thorough presentation to the Russellville Planning Commission later this year, which will then vote on whether or not to recommend the city council approve future projects.

The bike lane on Joplin street makes great on street parking. If you want to see what narrow streets will do to Russellville, just drive through Dardanelle. Semi trucks are practically bumping mirrors and usually drive in the center turning lane to find enough room to squeeze through. Maybe they should do something useful and make it illegal to pull out into a turning lane to merge into traffic. I watched a guy pull out into a turning lane a few days ago as an ambulance was coming down main street. Not knowing what the guy was gonna do, the ambulance swung left through the oncoming lanes to get around him. Is see things like this every day. I spent 20 years driving in Omaha, Nebraska and never felt the constant fear for my life driving to work every day that I have since moving back home. People in this town think as long as you have enough room to skid to a stop then it's okay for them to pull out in front of you. If you put in bike lanes on Main street, I bet you that people will use them to pass slower drivers. Oh, and look at the roundabout on Detroit on a rainy day and you will see how many people drive across the bricks.